Futurama: "Mobius Dick"

Season 6, Episode 21

Moby Dick? How original.

Somehow, I’ve never read Moby Dick, not have I seen any of the adaptations. It was never required reading in high school – I was a GT student – and I had enough AP English credits to skip having to take any literature courses in college. As for the adaptations, well, I admit I’ve never had too much interest in the work, no matter the format. That’s because Herman Melville’s story has become so ingrained in our culture that I feel like I know what the novel is about. I may not know the whole plot, but I understand the basic premise, and I’ve managed to grasp the story’s basic themes and symbolism.

And that I think is the main problem with “Mobius Dick”. Futurama has done reference episodes like this is past, where a large chunk of the episode, if not the whole thing, gets turned over to recreating some famous piece of pop culture. Usually this move works for the show, as the piece of pop culture being riffed on is just famous enough to warrant a mention, yet not so ubiquitous that the reference feels forced or cheesy.

That wasn’t the case here. Moby Dick is old, and thus there have been plenty of chances for Hollywood and the media world at large to riff on the work long before Futurama came along. (My favorite has always been the references that were worked into the comic book Bone, but that’s neither here nor there.) So what it feels like now, with Futurama finally getting in on this trend, is that the show is scraping the bottom of the creativity barrel, and referencing The Classics for a lack of a better idea.

Now, “Mobius” had the balls to fully commit to the homage in tonight’s episode, throwing in the symbolism of obsession and personal sacrifice, and I respect that this show respect the source material enough to do that. HOWEVER, sticking to the source material also meant that the show had to give up things like characterization and plotting, as Leela had to become very crazy and obsessive very fast in order for the episode to work, and that didn’t sit well with me. Now, I think the show try to explain this away with talk about how the whale both represented and caused Leela’s obsession, but that type of meta-textuality seemed to throw the whole reality of the episode into question, which basically caused things to make even less sense than they already did.

This isn’t to say that the entire episode was a bust. I rather enjoyed the scenes with the whole Planet Express crew aboard the ship riffing on one another, and the gags of the fourth dimension and Zoidberg’s random hair grow were also good for laughs. But it didn’t feel like there were enough of these kinds of jokes to justify the bare-boned, haphazard plot that held all of it together.

Quotes, Etc.:

“I remember it like it was interesting.”

“All the grieving families will be there…plus a popsicle cart!”

“Brace yourselves. It’s Tickle-Me-Elmo’s fire!”

“Oh right, and there was a giant killer space whale.”

“Wow, interesting. I’m both impressed and being eaten.”

“Look at him go. Like a millionaire on a cocktail weenie.”

“You been hittin’ the Red Stripe, woman!”

“I’m no doctor, but I believe you be displaying signs of illin’.”

“Maybe if I move the compass like this, it will kill the space whale!”

“Use boaty talk!”

“I spent a semester in Africa harpooning giraffes. And giraffes are just land space whales.”

“With me OXO Good Grips cheese knife, I stab at thee…You do know I’m stabbing at thee, right?”

“Not to mention those socks from the dryer, right?” “Shut up, Zoidberg!”

“Holy crap, fourth dimensional bowels!” “Einstein was right.”

“Can’t mourn the dead without a popsicle!”

“My days of joy and luck are over. Guess I should quit that club."